With the rapid expansion of the credit card industry and the widespread use of personalized cards as a source of identification, there has been a need to increase the efficiency in which personalized cards are mailed to customers. Originally, personalized cards were manually attached to their respective personalized form letter and were manually folded and placed in an envelope to be mailed to the customer. This manual process rapidly gave way to automated card affixing and form folding mechanisms which greatly increased the efficiency of the mailing process.
Conventional automated card affixing and form folding systems use buckle folding technology. In the conventional buckle folding system, the forms are first printed with the necessary customer information. Second, the forms are fed into a conventional buckle folder for folding. In operation, a conventional buckle folder uses rollers to feed the pre-printed form against a stopping plate. As the form is fed against the stopping plate, the form is caused to buckle. A pair of rotating fold rollers are positioned adjacent to the stopping plate such that when the form begins to buckle, the buckled form is fed into the pair of rotating fold rollers thereby creating a fold at the buckled portion of the form.
For conventional buckle folders to work properly, they must feed the form though very narrow pathway clearances and around tight curves. The narrow pathways and tight curves are incompatible with folding forms having cards already attached. Therefore, to use a conventional folder in the card mailing industry, the form must be folded before the cards are attached. To attach cards to the pre-folded form, the form must be unfolded to expose the interior flaps.
Because the conventional buckle folder uses a two step process of folding and unfolding the form, it requires extra equipment and is therefore more expensive than a folder that can fold a form having cards already attached. Additionally, in the case of C-folds or Z-folds, the personalized cards can only be affixed to the two panels of the form which have been opened. No cards can be affixed to the bottom panel. In contrast, cards affixed to the form before it is folded can be affixed at any location on the form. In this way, a folder that folds a form having cards already attached provides greater card placement flexibility to enhance the presentation of the card to the customer.
Another problem with the conventional buckle folder is that it cannot create different types of folds such as V-folds, C-folds or Z-folds without mechanical alteration. This inflexibility is not consistent with the needs of a customer who wants a machine that can easily produce a variety of folds.
A second type of folder used in the card mailing industry is a modified buckle folder. As compared to the conventional buckle folder, the modified buckle folder has more open passageways and more gradual curves. Therefore, the modified buckle folder can fold forms having cards already attached. However, for the modified buckle folder to work properly, the forms must be made of heavy paper having perforations where the form is to be folded. Heavy perforated paper is expensive and aesthetically less attractive than standard form paper.
A third type of folder used in the card mailing industry is a plow folder. Plow folders use long curved form guides to gradually fold a form as the form is fed widthwise along the guide. The fold is completed by feeding the form through a set of rollers. Plow folders can fold a form having cards attached. However, plow folders have difficulty controlling the accuracy of the fold. Additionally, plow folders consume a great deal of space and require 90 degree turn mechanisms to make the folders compatible with the lengthwise form transport direction of conventional printing, card affixing and envelop stuffing mechanisms. Finally, the plow folder can not make extremely tight folds without de-embossing the affixed cards or leaving an imprint on the form.
In regards to affixing a card to a form, the card mailing industry utilizes a variety of affixing systems. For example, some systems simply use glue. Other systems use pre-cut slits in the form or double sided tape to affix a card to the form. More recent developments in the card affixing industry have focused upon card affixing systems that use an adhesive strip having a heat sensitive adhesive side and a pressure sensitive adhesive side.
In operation, the heat sensitive adhesive side of the sticker is first attached to the back of the personalized card. Second, the personalized card is moved onto its respective form. Third, a press mechanism having a pad exerts area pressure on the front side of the personalized card thereby causing the pressure sensitive adhesive attached to the back of the card to bond with the surface of the form thereby affixing the personalized card to the form. The bond between the heat sensitive adhesive and the back of the personalized card is weaker than the bond between the pressure sensitive adhesive and the form surface. If the pressure sensitive adhesive is properly bonded to the surface of the form, the difference in bond strength allows the personalized card to be pulled from the form without leaving any adhesive residue on the back of the card.
Existing card affixing mechanisms which utilize adhesive as a means of affixing cards to forms have several problems. First, existing card affixing mechanisms lack flexibility in being able to place the personalized cards at any location on the form. Second, existing card affixing mechanisms use powerful stamping mechanisms to exert area pressure on the face of the card, thereby bonding the pressure sensitive adhesive to the surface of the form. Due to the intense pressure exerted by the stamping mechanism, the personalized card can be de-embossed or an imprint can be left on the form. Additionally, large stamping mechanisms are expensive to manufacture and operate. Third, the area pressure exerted by the stamping mechanism is often uneven across the surface of the card. This disproportionate pressure causes some of the pressure sensitive adhesive to bond to the surface of the form while leaving other pressure sensitive adhesive unbonded. Because all of the pressure sensitive adhesive is not bonded to the surface of the form, when the card is pulled from the form by the customer, paper and adhesive residue is often, left on the back of the card. Fourth, the adhesive strip needs to be placed precisely under the stamping pad in order to effectively affix the card to the form.